EDITORIAL: Autocracy or democracy (10/17/04)

EDITORIAL

Autocracy or democracy

Having taken Russia backwards by applying Soviet-era methods, President Vladimir Putin is now trying to recreate Ukraine in the image of Russia. Remember, Mr. Putin has muzzled the media, jailed his opponents, made sure that his appointees control the regions, etc. And, oh yes, there was that pseudo-election that he "won." Mr. Putin doesn't perceive his country as "neo-Soviet," like many in the West do - the former KGB agent prefers the term "managed democracy" to describe what he has wrought. But democracy it surely ain't.

Now President Putin has decided to help Ukraine in its presidential election - a real presidential election with real candidates (well, at least two of them), and real choices for the future of Ukraine. Various media reports have indicated that Mr. Putin has ordered his cronies to help elect Viktor Yanukovych. The Russian media also have had a hand in this scheme, providing positive coverage of the Ukrainian prime minister, while utilizing what is known as "black PR" against Viktor Yushchenko.

Of course, Moscow's preference in Ukraine's presidential election has been clear all along. As the Wall Street Journal put it in its editorial of September 21, "Putin's Russia and the U.S. and Europe have conflicting interests here. From experience, Mr. Putin knows that democratic neighbors naturally gravitate toward the West. Witness Georgia's attempts to shake off Russian meddling after last year's 'Rose Revolution.' Mr. Kuchma's Ukraine also leaned toward NATO and the EU before the sitting president became mired in corruption and other scandals. The Russian president, who embraced Mr. Kuchma in his troubled years, this summer all but endorsed his hand-picked successor."

Now Mr. Putin has openly endorsed Mr. Yanukovych, as evidenced by the scenes as Messrs. Kuchma and Yanukovych traveled to Moscow last week to attend a 52nd birthday celebration for the Russian president. Russian authorities even went as far as to help organize a congress of Ukrainian associations in Russia to urge Ukrainian citizens who live in Russia to vote for Mr. Yanukovych. Plus, Patriarch Aleksei II of the Russian Orthodox Church presented Mr. Yanukovych with the icon of Our Lady of Vladimir, "which symbolizes the unity of historical roots of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples," reported ITAR-TASS.

It must be noted that Mr. Yanukovych has endeared himself to Mr. Putin and to Russian voters in Ukraine through his support for the Single Economic Space and his overall orientation toward Russia, and by pledging to support Russian as a state language in Ukraine, to introduce dual citizenship and to simplify travel procedures between the two countries.

Back in Ukraine, just like President Putin, President Kuchma is controlling the media and silencing his opponents. He and Prime Minister Yanukovych are using state resources at their disposal to support the Yanukovych candidacy and, at the same time, to blemish and otherwise diminish that of Mr. Yushchenko. And, a Kremlin insider Gleb Pavlovsky, who guided the public relations strategy in Mr. Putin's presidential campaign, has been dispatched to Ukraine for the election campaign.

Take, for example, the suspected poisoning of the Our Ukraine leader. A fake press release from the Vienna clinic that treated Mr. Yushchenko somehow got distributed via the Reuters news agency and, as a result, false information stating that the opposition leader was not poisoned appeared in countless media outlets around the globe. The Ukrainian media jumped to report first that Mr. Yushchenko was misleading the public, then questioned his lifestyle and most recently depicted him as chronically ill and thus unsuited for the presidency. (According to some sources, the fake release has been traced to a Russian-based public relations firm.) All that comes on top of other depictions of Mr. Yushchenko as a rabid chauvinist, a fascist and a puppet of the United States. Indeed, American symbols are being utilized by Mr. Yushchenko's opponents on a series of posters depicting him as the U.S. choice for president and creating a fear of U.S. control over Ukraine.

The goal of all of the foregoing machinations and dirty tricks is really quite simple: to turn Ukraine into a vassal state of the Russian Federation. The choice for Ukraine's voters should be equally simple: a vote for autocracy (Yanukovych) or a vote for democracy (Yushchenko).

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